


Hard as Diamonds

by ResplendentRi



Category: Dangan Ronpa
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Alternate Universe - Non-Despair, Amputation, F/M, Gen, M/M, life sucks but at least no one gets beaten to death, more to come later - Freeform, those four are the ones who are definitely going to show up, title may be subject to change
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2013-12-03
Updated: 2013-12-03
Packaged: 2018-01-03 08:48:27
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,630
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1068484
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ResplendentRi/pseuds/ResplendentRi
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Oowada Daiya has spent his life trying to give his brother every opportunity there is, even at the expense of his own. After the accident that nearly claimed his life leaves him with a life-changing injury, he has to figure out what he's going to do next. Good thing he's still got his brother. And he'll make some friends along the way, too.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Hard as Diamonds

**Author's Note:**

> So my new guilty pleasure ship is Daiya/Chiaki because it would be adorable, and this Daiya lives AU is one that's been bouncing around in my head for a while, so I decided to combine the two into one fluffy, angsty mess.
> 
> ...That's presently over 20,000 words with no end in sight. I'm so sorry. (Maybe I can get someone else to ship it with me.)
> 
> This is also an AU where Chiaki is Chihiro's older half-sister (same mother, Chiaki is a child from a previous marriage), in order to make the ship at all plausible.
> 
> Heed the content warning re: amputation - Daiya loses his left leg in this chapter. The amputation isn't detailed on-screen in any graphic way, but some of the medical and long-term consequences of it are going to be a driving point in the story.

Even in hindsight, Daiya Oowada considered that day to be the second proudest of his life. It was two weeks after his twentieth birthday, and he'd spent the last four months organizing the Crazy Diamonds into some kind of state that he could step down as leader and leave the gang in Mondo's hands. Never for a second had he considered that it was a big thing to expect from the younger Oowada, that he was asking a lot of his brother to take on the entire five-thousand member band as its sole leader. The fifteen-year-old had proved himself over and over again as Daiya's second in command, and in the older Oowada's opinion, he couldn't leave the Diamonds in more capable hands.

He had announced his retirement as leader of the Crazy Diamonds on the day of his birthday. This had given the many thousands of members (past and present) ample time to pay their respects to both their departing leader and their incumbent leader. He spent two weeks accepting gratitude and overtures of respect. "Aniki, the Crazy Diamonds changed my life." "Aniki, nothing I ever say will express my gratitude for all that you and the Diamonds have given me."

He noticed that not a single one of them ever addressed Mondo as "Aniki," but he didn't think anything of it. There wasn't a single one who thought themselves big enough to call Mondo by his first name (if they had, Mondo wouldn't have hesitated to invert their face), so as long as they deferred to him by calling him "Oowada," then calling him "aniki" would follow in time once Daiya's influence was gone. Mondo had proved himself as a suitable leader to Daiya. In time, he would have no problem proving it to the gang as well. He was so sure that he didn't hear what the gang said behind his back.

Daiya's last night with the Crazy Diamonds was spent with his brother and some of the other members. Even just restricting it to the highest ranked Diamonds had a gathering of at least fifty or more, and everyone was rowdy and a little bit drunk and ready to make awful decisions. They went out on one last ride with Daiya as their leader, smashed up some mailboxes, got thrown out of a ramen shop, a normal Friday night for the Crazy Diamonds.

Daiya never expected Mondo to challenge him to a race. He didn't try to talk him out of it, either. Maybe it was the ill-gotten beer that was working its way out of his system, but something in him understood. He understood what his brother was doing, what he wanted. It was a breach of respect, but Mondo needed to prove himself capable of replacing Daiya.

Daiya accepted the challenge. They got on their bikes and spent a few minutes revving their engines and talking shit to each other with their voices raised over the roars of their engines. The heavily-modified motorcycles were dependable, and fast. Daiya was going to miss the feel of the hot metal purring between his thighs, the buttery leather smooth and soft underneath him.

He didn't know how much he was going to miss it yet.

"Are you just gonna sit there talking or are we gonna race, Aniki?" Mondo yelled. Daiya laughed.

"Come on then, you little shit! Eat my dust!" he yelled back in reply. The Diamonds there to watch cheered louder when their leader took the challenge to his authority in good humor. Daiya wasn't dumb enough not to realize how they looked to him for how to respond. He was far from letting Mondo win, but their reaction made him realize that maybe this challenge was more necessary than he originally thought.

They kicked up their kick stands and roared off in a spray of dust and gravel. One of the other Diamonds followed behind on their own bike, uninterested in the race but zooming along as a neutral agent. Daiya gunned it, pulling ahead of Mondo, much to his younger brother's disgust. After passing him, Daiya spent a while seeing no sign of Mondo. He wove in and out of traffic, following the rhythm of the cars and trucks around him as easily as if it was instinct (which, by now, it was). The blare of the irritated car horns was white noise to him, used as he was to hearing it, and he was completely confident that they knew better than to stop in Diamonds territory. Not if they wanted their windshields to stay intact.

It was then that he saw a flash of white speed through traffic on the other side of the row of cars. Daiya gunned the engine harder and leaned forward, pushing through and glimpsing for a flash of Mondo's coat or motorcycle through the press of cars. When they broke out of traffic, he saw his brother thirty feet ahead of him and pulling further. The gap began to close now that Daiya was free to push as hard as he could, and Mondo turned his head over his shoulder to see where Daiya was. Daiya grit his teeth and pressed forward. Mondo was riding stupidly recklessly, exactly like Daiya had taught him never to do. There was no point in leading one of the most feared bosozoku gangs in Japan if he was going to die in a motorcycle crash.

Mondo grinned cheekily, ignoring his brother's frustration in lieu of his own triumph. Daiya felt his heart drop out of his chest when suddenly Mondo's cocky form was silhouetted in the bright headlights of a truck.

"MONDO!" he screamed, gunning it and pushing his bike to its limit to catch up. Mondo turned forward and froze when he saw the truck. Daiya caught up just as the truck did as well, and he jackknifed his motorcycle, forcing Mondo out of the path of the truck at the last second. The last thing that he saw before the searing impact crashed into his side was Mondo's bike spin out and his brother sprawl against the pavement. The headlights of the truck overwhelmed his vision, but the worst part was the pain that followed. Sheer agony lanced through his entire body, fire searing his skin and driving out of him even the ability to scream.

The next thing he was aware of was his brother's voice.

"Aniki! _Aniki_!" Mondo screamed. Daiya sucked in a hiss of pain when he felt his brother's arms peel him off the ground. He was battered and broken and bleeding, but he held onto the fraying threads of agony lancing through his body, anchoring himself to the sound of Mondo's voice as he opened his eyes.

"Mondo..." he groaned in pain. It took his brain a heavy lagging second to process that Mondo in front of him had a little bit of road rash on his cheek, but was otherwise unscathed from what Daiya could tell.

"Oh thank fuck," Mondo breathed a sigh of relief. "You're okay, you're going to be okay, Aniki, I promise," he babbled. "I'll- I'll call an ambulance, just hang on."

"Mondo," Daiya said a little more clearly, his brows tugging downward in concentration. Shadows lurked on the edges of his vision, and his eyelids were impossibly heavy. "Promise me, don't let the gang break up. It's a gang you and I made together, after all..." he said. The effort was an agony just to breathe, but he felt like he had to keep going. "Make me a promise... a promise between two men." Mondo's face was blotched and reddened, but he nodded.

"I promise," he choked. "Don't talk like that. You're going to be okay. Don't give up yet- Stay with me, Aniki, please..." Daiya felt Mondo's grip on his shoulders waver. "Oh fuck, your leg..." Daiya throbbed from head to toe, but he focused on the sound of Mondo's voice. The sound of his brother's voice was soothing to him, and he held onto it like a lifeline. Everything else wavered in and out of focus, but he hung onto Mondo's every word, until the red and blue flashing lights of the ambulance seared across his eyelids.

"Sir, get back," an unfamiliar voice broke in.

"No!" Mondo screamed, panicked. "He's my brother! I have to go with him!" Daiya let out a feeble cough that wracked his body with pain when a strange pair of arms peeled him away from his brother's chest. He could still hear Mondo yelling, pleading with the paramedics, but he was quickly losing the ability to focus on the words until the pain finally overwhelmed him, and he blacked out when they moved his neck to put a brace around it.

 

The light shining through his eyelids was sterile and painful when he awoke. For a brief second, everything was blank, searingly white when he dared to slit his eyes open, and he let out a hoarse groan of displeasure, squeezing his eyes closed again.

"Aniki?" It almost didn't sound like Mondo. He sounded _fifteen_ , and _scared_ , and Daiya was reminded sharply that that was how old he actually was. It broke him out of his groggy state, and he immediately turned his head toward the sound.

"Mondo?" he asked. Mondo was on his feet immediately, his hands squeezing Daiya's like a vise.

"Shit, shit I'm so sorry," he babbled. "God, I'm such a fucking idiot. Fuck! I was so fucking stupid, aniki, it's all my fault—" he said. Daiya squeezed Mondo's hand as hard as he could, fighting off a pounding headache between his ears. He couldn't see Mondo's face – the boy had his head bowed and his pompadour hiding his face in shadow. His shoulders were shaking, tremors that Daiya might not have noticed immediately if they hadn't traveled all the way down to his hands.

"Help me up," Daiya said, his other hand groping on the arm of the bed for the button to raise the head of the bed. Mondo jumped at the order, immediately reaching across Daiya to press the button for him. The head of the bed started folding upward with an almost insufferable whirr to Daiya's pounding head.

"Are you okay? Are you in pain?" Mondo asked. Daiya shook his head, despite the sore ache throughout his body. Considering the fact that he was hit by a truck, he was lucky just to be aching. His left leg in particular felt like pins and needles dancing their way up his spine. "Fuck, I'm so sorry, Aniki," Mondo said again.

"It's okay," Daiya said. "It's okay, little man, come on." Everything about Mondo wobbled, and he didn't answer. The last of the anesthetic seemed to flee Daiya's body all at once with what felt like a single beat of his heart. "Mondo?" he asked.

"I’m s—" Mondo choked. His fingers gripped the arm of the bed until his knuckles went white. Daiya finally looked down at the bed. He saw the outline of one leg against the blanket. His right toes were right there, where he could move them (which he did, flexing them once).

The outline of his left leg stopped at the knee.

He whipped the blanket back before he could realize that he wasn't wearing underwear, but luckily the gown he was wearing instead of his clothes was just long enough to keep his little brother from getting a big old eyeful of something that he didn't want to see.

The white bandages started in the middle of his thigh and wrapped around the end of his leg. The _end_ of his-- His leg was gone from the knee down. He felt it there sure as anything, but it was _gone_.

He only dimly heard Mondo whimper to his left at the sight of the missing leg.

"No..." he said.

"I'm sorry," Mondo said. "I'm so sorry."

"Mondo—"

"It's my fault!" he screamed. Daiya looked up at him in surprise, and saw his face blotched red with the fight against the guilty tears that had already smudged his eyeliner. "Your leg's fucking gone and it's my fault... You _told_ me not to ride recklessly, you taught me better than that, and now—and now you're hurt because you had to protect me..."

Daiya only hesitated for a second, before he reached out and wrapped the arm that wasn't bound up with tubes and needles around Mondo's waist, pulling him down onto the edge of the bed. Now that Daiya got a good look at it, the younger boy's unmistakable pompadour was a little disheveled, with stray hairs sticking up all through it. Mondo looked uncertain for a minute, staring at Daiya in shock as if trying to assess what his brother was asking of him when Daiya didn't stop pulling. But then he got the idea and curled up in the space next to his brother, taking in a deep, shaky breath and letting it out when he put his head on Daiya's chest and could feel the reassuring sound of his older brother's heartbeat.

"Shit, I don't know what I would've done if you hadn't made it, Aniki," he said quietly. Daiya cast a wary glance at the closed door to the room, expecting someone to come through at any minute. He didn't trust hospitals. He didn't like them, he didn't trust them, and he supposed that that would have to change soon because this one actually was the reason that he was alive at all.

Well, no, the reason why he was alive at all was currently curled up next to him. When Daiya ran away from home at 12 years old, the only reason he came back was Mondo. When he worked his ass off every day after school so that Mondo didn't have to worry about where his next meal was coming from, when he found a stray puppy and knew that Mondo would go apeshit as soon as he saw it. That was what he lived for, and that was what had given him the strength to survive. Sure, the hospital might've taken care of the technical stuff, but Daiya had his little brother to live _for_. He couldn't die yet.

"Well, I made it, didn't I?" Daiya asked, squeezing his brother tighter to his chest. "Come on, buck up, kid, I'm okay," he said.

Mondo was shaking like a leaf, curled against Daiya's chest. Daiya was still in shock. His leg was missing. But that didn't matter at the moment, the only thing that mattered was the fact that Mondo was scared, Mondo was his baby brother again, and suddenly Daiya wondered if he hadn't put too much weight on the teen's shoulders.

"You..." Mondo said. He looked up at Daiya, narrowly avoiding hitting his brother in the face with his pompadour. "Aniki, you're not okay. Your leg—"

"And you know what?" Daiya asked sharply, cutting off Mondo. It was half because he didn't want his kid brother to be beating himself up over something that had been out of his control, but half likewise because he didn't want to be reminded again and again. Mondo's purple eyes looked up at Daiya in confusion, but Daiya's tone left no room for him to cut back in. "I would do it again," Daiya said simply. His tone had softened somewhat, but there was still a hard edge to it that dared Mondo to object.

"But Aniki," Mondo protested anyway. He never had been the best at keeping his mouth shut unless he was explicitly told to. "That's not right. I can take care of myself!"

"You could have died if that truck had hit you!" Daiya yelled. Mondo shot upright, fire flashing in his eyes and his face flushed red with that temper of his that he had never managed to reign in.

" _You_ could have died saving me!" he yelled back. "What would I have done then, Aniki? What would I have fucking done, knowing that I killed my own brother!" Daiya went quiet. Mondo looked down at the floor, his pompadour obscuring his eyes from view. Daiya knew that it was a bad thing for his brother to get in the habit of doing, but he also knew that as a kid, Mondo had the tendency to wear his heart on his sleeve, and that was a bad habit for a man to get into too.

Noticing Mondo's pompadour finally also alerted Daiya to something different about himself – he couldn't see his own. He raised a hand to run it over his head, only to encounter the sterile feeling of gauze bandages wrapped all around his head. Mondo raised his eyes and noticed what his brother was doing, then turned away guiltily.

"You ate shit pretty hard," he muttered. "They said they had to cut your hair to check you out and make sure you were okay."

"They probably didn't want me using up all the municipal hair spray supply," Daiya said with a wry grin. "Don't worry about it, man, hair grows back. And it was about time for me to get it cut anyway. Can't go around copying your style if I'm not part of the Diamonds anymore, right?" Mondo's fists clenched, but even though he said nothing Daiya could hear his teeth gritting so hard they creaked. "Mondo, come on," he said.

"Your l—"

"Yeah, I know my leg's not gonna grow back," Daiya cut him off with a tinge of irritation. He was still trying to accept the fact that he was going to spend the rest of his life hobbling around on one leg, but there was nothing that could be done about it now.

"What do you mean 'I know'?" Mondo asked irritably. He snatched the blanket and put it over Daiya's leg again, which Daiya appreciated because looking at the stump was pretty disheartening.

"I mean I know," he snapped back. "Leave it alone, alright? I told you it's not your fault."

"It _is_ my fault—" Mondo protested.

"Were you the one driving the fucking truck?"

"I was the one driving recklessly when you've always told me not to!" Mondo snapped back. "I was the one who was so focused on that stupid race that I never even saw the fucking truck until you pushed me out of the way!" Daiya noticed the bandages around Mondo's arm when his wild gesturing slid the jacket of his coat up.

"You got hurt," he said. It wasn't a question. Mondo froze.

"It's nothing," he said. "Just a little bit of road rash where I ate shit when you pushed me out of the way. I would've gotten way worse if it wasn't for you," he admitted, picking at the bandage idly. Daiya reached out and grabbed his wrist. "What the hell, man, that hurts!" Mondo snapped.

"Did you get it checked out?" Daiya asked.

" _Yes_ , fuck!" Mondo said, pulling his wrist away. "You've been unconscious for like three hours, it took them like twenty minutes to flush all the shit out and slap a bandage on it. I'm fine, Aniki, you're the one I'm worried about!"

"I'm fine now," Daiya said. "Don't worry about me, kid, nothing keeps an Oowada down for long. I'll be out of here before you know it."

"You're gonna stay with me at the Diamonds hideout," Mondo insisted.

"Mondo, it's time for me to get my own place."

"Come on, at least until you find somewhere," Mondo said. "It's the least I can do, I don't wanna have to worry about you." Daiya sighed. He knew it was just inviting trouble to refuse at this point, and he always had a soft spot for his kid brother anyway, so he nodded in acknowledgment.

"You drive a hard bargain, kid," he said. "Alright, you win. But as soon as I've got a job and a place of my own, I'm out, alright?"

"Alright, alright," Mondo agreed with a very adolescent roll of his eyes. He stared at Daiya for a long moment, standing there like he wanted to act but he didn't know how or what to do. "Fuck, I can't believe you made it. I really thought you were a goner, Aniki," he said finally, his voice choking with tears.

"Come here," Daiya said, his voice soft and sympathetic. "Get back down here, you little shit." He gestured until Mondo curled up next to him again. With the slow rise and fall of Mondo's chest against his side, sleepiness started stealing back over the edges of Daiya's vision. He closed his eyes and rested his cheek against the curly hair on top of Mondo's head, inhaling deeply. He didn't say anything when Mondo's strong frame started shaking, even when he felt tears dripping onto the thin, paper-like material of the gown that Daiya was still wearing.

"I'm sorry," Mondo whispered. "I'm so fucking sorry, Aniki..." Daiya consolingly rubbed Mondo's shoulder through the boy's coat, feeling like he was soothing a little kid again. He remembered the night he came back after running away from home. Nursing the bruises he got from their father, sniffling alone in his room, when Mondo came in and crawled under his blanket with him. Mondo was only eight, he didn't know what Daiya had done, or why he'd run away. Even now, seven years later, if Mondo had figured out that it was him and him alone who was the reason that Daiya came back at all, then it wasn't because Daiya told him.

"It's okay, Mondo," Daiya murmured, squeezing Mondo's shoulders a little tighter. "We're okay." He pressed his lips to the top of his brother's head enough for Mondo to feel it even through his caked-on hairspray. "We're okay."


End file.
